


Play Fair

by kihadu



Category: The Losers - All Media Types
Genre: M/M, Telepathy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-10
Updated: 2015-12-21
Packaged: 2018-04-08 17:14:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 16,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4313508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kihadu/pseuds/kihadu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cougar's telepathic, but that doesn't mean he hears everything. Still, he can't believe he missed this.</p><p>(They've both got a secret.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Cougar didn’t join the army because of it. The only thing he did because of that - this. This thing that’s part of him, his skin and his soul and his blood, an extra layer making him something not quite human. The only thing he did because of it was talk less. Easier to let the extra thoughts in, by talking less.

A hundred feet was the range, tested on the oval at his primary school. He'd not been born with it, exactly. It had developed, or grown. Like his hair and his coordination and his ability to problem solve. But it hadn't been like long-division, a sudden day where it all clicked. There hadn’t a lightbulb moment, a sudden flood of conscious not his own.

And he didn’t join the army to escape it.

He joined the army for the same reason a lot of people joined the army: it was a guaranteed bed and a proper paycheck, training that promised at a bright future, a long career in the army or out. He had seven siblings and his family was extensive, and close, shared everything from food to socks, but there wasn’t ever any pocketmoney growing up.

He didn’t understand excess, had never been taught it, had never had it. Excess only when it came to reading. Libraries, at least, were free. And books, at least, he could manage. A hike to a place far enough away that it wasn’t likely anyone would stroll past in the edge of his range to interrupt with a passing thought of the weather, him and a book. It was the closest to quiet he ever found.

The army. Well. The army was a disaster, and he was too late in before he realised just how much of a mistake it was.

All through high school he’d found there were certain people that weren’t worth the space their name took up on roll-call, and in the army all those people seemed to have clustered together.

He gritted his teeth. Threw away ideas that here perhaps he’d find a home. He became a sniper because it meant he’d be far away from anyone, and because he could sit still for hours, and because he didn’t mind not talking.

He didn’t make any friends. Didn’t put down any roots.

He heard them whispering about him, of course, and heard those other things, the second-whispers, the fleeting shimmering ideas. Pity, but more irritation. They ragged on him not just because he was an easy target; he made them uncomfortable. He understood. Didn’t blame them.

He drifted. Stopped writing home, and they didn’t seem to notice. Alone, adrift in the wind. Sometimes he felt so isolated he could scream. He read his books about people making friends, finding their karass, and found himself aching. Empty.

He could hear everyone. His bunk-mate’s whispered half-dreaming thoughts about his girlfriend waiting for him, could hear his staff-sergeant's worry about how good a job he was doing, could hear when one of the women in the shed over rang her niece to talk shit about boys, could hear - everything.

It wasn’t something he could turn off. He’d tried, nearly driven himself insane back in middle-school for trying, but it was true. Some things were nature and some things were nuture. He’d been brought up Catholic but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t bend the rules a little to learn to love himself.

If no one else, at least he’d always have his own company.

So he read a lot. Killed more people than he counted, for all that he remembered them as best he could. Dreamed in greyscale, didn’t talk back, took orders as best as they were given him, stepped out of fights before they started.

Counted down the days until his service was over, and then - signed up again.

There was nothing for him stateside.

 

-

 

Jensen couldn’t figure him out. Sure, he was all-around shit at figuring out actual humans, but Cougar was a weird step above and beyond, and Jensen didn’t like puzzles.

Cougar had arrived in the gang four weeks three days prior, and so far he’d said three words.

‘Yes sir’, and ‘thanks’.

The ‘thanks’ had been in addition to a nod, and Jensen was still convinced that Cougar hadn’t actually meant to say it. He didn’t talk much. Kept his space clean, kept his space - didn’t touch anyone.

The Losers were a group different to the rest of the army, and Jensen took half the credit and crowed it loud whenever anyone wanted to listen. Jensen really liked cuddling. His usual manner was to find someone already stationary and just fall into their space. Three punches from Roque but now even he was in on it, a comfy pillow, plenty of fat to turn those muscles into comfortable pillows.

But not Cougar. Cougar had flinched so hard the first time Jensen had come anywhere near him that Jensen was taking his time. It had been scarcely a month, barely over thirty days, and he had time.

Rumour was the Losers was the last place for a soldier unfit for proper duty, high turnover and bad attitudes, people ready for discharge or death, but it wasn’t anything like that, not really.

It was Pooch talking about family and cooking and tv shows like he wasn’t nursing a burned hand from where he’d had to jimmy together a shot-up engine to get them the hell out of town faster than bulletfire. There was Roque and his knife collection and easy grins that hinted slow murder and set bugs crawling under Jensen’s skin. And Clay and his gruff, aggressively macho mannerisms that softened into friendliness as soon as Jensen cracked a joke.

And Cougar.

Cougar was new, but Jensen was happy to take his time with that. He reckoned that Cougar was gonna stick around for a good long while.

 

-

 

Cougar woke up immediately, like always. He was never sure if he dreamed or if it was everyone else’s dreams that filtered in. Either way his night had been a weird mix of high-rises and children and walking on clouds.

It felt like peeling off a second-skin, and he showered before going for a run, for all that he’d have to come back and shower again, this time with a damp towel.

Running was a fleeting mash of thoughts as he passed them - _what was that poem it was a good one; miss my dog; coffee then breakfast or maybe juice haven’t had juice for a while; run to the hill or the flag can never decide; running I goddamn love running_ \- that last one sounded like Jensen’s mind.

Cougar slowed just enough to let him catch up.

‘Fancy seeing you out here,’ said Jensen, with a flash of thought Cougar didn’t quite catch. It was always muddled, discerning thoughts from speech. Jensen talked a mile a minute but he thought at the same pace.

This was half the reason Cougar didn’t talk. Picking what to respond to was complicated.

‘Gonna be a shit of a day,’ Jensen said, casting his eyes up, thinking about the forecast he’d seen already, thinking about the training he knew Cougar had scheduled over at the range, thinking about his sister who he hadn’t seen in seven years, thinking, thinking.

Cougar picked up his pace by a second or two, and at the next bend he left Jensen behind to a disappointed, brain-whispered _oh_.

He never considered it an invasion of privacy. He couldn’t control it, and in any case, who would he tell? He used it as much as he felt like - easier to pick up in bars if you hit on people already wanting to flirt - but he didn’t sell secrets. Didn’t pick fights with people who thought nasty things, didn’t use knowledge unfairly gathered.

An island unto himself.

Case in point was dinner that evening. The mess hall was loud and Cougar usually kept his head down and didn’t even attempt to follow a conversation. He let the voices and thoughts wash over him, not paying attention to any one particular person, same as anyone in a sea of conversation, when there was a phrase that caught him and he automatically jerked his head slightly, as if his ears helped him hear minds.

 _-oh god if there’s a mind-reader here I’m so fucking sorry, I just got laid really good and I can’t stop thinking about it_ \- and there was a mess of incomprehensible actions all out of sequence, sensations that shivered over Cougar’s skin, images that flashed, but he couldn’t pick out the person or the partner - _I never knew women tasted so good, I’m giving up on men - fuck! - and then an abashed - hypothetical mind reader please don’t out me, that would suck, look, I’ll think loud thoughts about anything else_

\- and then the thinker deteriorated into a mess of attempts at thinking seriously about themes in a book Cougar had never read mixed with repeated thoughts of the sex they’d had, and Cougar could do little more than huff a laugh that Jensen immediately caught.

_Are you laughing at my joke please look at me I want you to laugh at my joke even though I’m pretty sure you weren’t listening to me, do you ever listen to me -_

Cougar snapped his head up to meet Jensen’s eyes, finding a shocked, unblinking stare.

A breath, a mere fleeting faint thought washed and lost into the mess - _you have really beautiful eyes_.

Cougar dropped his eyes to his food and tried to forget Jensen. Tried to shove him away.

 

The next morning he woke up again to the complicated task of untangling himself from other people’s dreams, went for a run, and was on his way to get breakfast before heading off for more exercise when Roque called him over.

He knew, of course, before Clay spoke, before they had even all reached his office.

Another mission.

 

-

 

Cougar didn’t know how long it had been since Pooch had gotten laid because of the telepathy. He knew it because Jensen had obnoxiously gone around the circle, and since Cougar knew more about anyone than he had any right to know he had an aggressive policy for being honest. If he was asked a question he’d answer it.

So he’d shared without blinking, and him speaking had shocked Pooch into answering even though everyone could count how long it had been since he’d had leave.

And that had left Jensen with a jumbled mess of thoughts from cleaning his gun to, ahem, cleaning his gun, which made Jensen chuckle a small laugh and Cougar let himself smile even though the joke hadn’t been verbalised. Jensen glanced over and Cougar shook his head. There was no way to explain it.

He’d never explained it.

But Jensen didn’t demand an answer, he just grinned to see Cougar nearly smiling, nodded like they’d shared a joke - like Jensen knew they’d shared a joke, and kept on doing what he was doing.

And that was the start of the problem. That mission. If Cougar had to pinpoint, that was when it all started to fall apart.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry this chapter took so long to get done! It's been a wild few months in my life and writing has fallen to the wayside, but I still have A Plan for this one, and no intention of leaving it unfinished.

Jensen wasn’t really ideal 9-5 working material. He didn’t mesh well with others. If there was a problem, he goddamn let that person know. He didn’t stay focused. Didn’t keep on task. Didn’t set goals.

His leadership potential was next to none. Future career prospects: about the same. He avoided work as much as he could, took direction only when it suited him. He liked to sleep about fourteen hours a day and ate like food personally offended him.

Cougar hadn’t been around Jensen much before that first mission, so he didn’t notice any of this. He wasn’t much for analysing the company he kept; usually they did that themselves and he just read their minds. He had noticed that Jensen’s mind didn’t quite work like everyone else’s, but he’d been too distracted to properly mull it over, or pay any particular attention to the man.

Back at base the Loser’s hut was big, more an old gym than a building met for residents. Cougar had been offered the choice between two old offices, and had naturally taken the one slightly further from everyone else. That left Jensen on the other side of the building, and their interactions that first month had been limited, and Cougar, naturally, had spoken next to never.

The flight over was with another company, who, like them, were disappearing off into Location Redacted, but unlike them, when they landed in Germany they got out and wandered away, and the Losers took a bathroom break and boarded another plane.

From Germany Pooch flew them south, while Roque watched a movie on a tablet, Clay read the only novel he seemed to have ever read, Jensen napped (again!), and Cougar stared at the maps of where they were going.

It was meant to be an in and out mission. Intelligence had marked a few locations for him to set up a nest and pick off prey from a distance, and he stared at the topography, memorised each icon, the distance between key features. Visualised the space in his head.

Useless, it turned out.

They got to drive to near location, and then walk the rest of the way. They got lost twice. The maps were wrong, and it was only Jensen with an oddly uncanny sense of direction who managed to figure everything out and get them to the camp they were to disband.

Later, Cougar would realise that Jensen had never once even looked at a map; when Clay had handed them out Jensen had turned his into a paper plane and hit Pooch in the head with it.

They surveyed their actual land.

‘We sure it’s ours to hit?’ asked Pooch.

‘Layout’s the same,’ said Clay. He was still clinging to his map; Cougar had already folded his away. It hadn’t said much, just topography and a vague outline of landmarks.

‘Sir,’ Cougar began, a start of a protest against what Clay was about to say.

‘Cougar, you’re going in with us.’

‘Sir,’ Cougar repeated.

‘You have fought direct combat before, have you not?’

Cougar grimaced. Clay wasn’t going to let him win this one.

‘Hang behind Pooch and Jensen. Don’t get between them,’ Clay added. A whisper behind the voice: _they already work as a team don’t fuck this up, don’t want the new guy dead but no place for a sniper -_

‘Yes, sir,’ Cougar said, to interrupt the thoughts.

_Aw yeah Cougar’s playing in the field!_

Cougar gave Jensen a startled look.

‘Isn’t this kinda cool?’ Jensen asked. Cougar side-stepped the elbow nudge Jensen tried to give him. Instead of being hurt, Jense inwardly laughed and outwardly grinned. ‘Mark my words, you and me kitty-cat, I’ll give you a hug one day.’ Cougar gave his very best death glare. ‘Aw, don’t look so grumpy, kitty-cat.’

‘You know what they say about pulling a tiger’s tail,’ Pooch warned.

‘Yeah, alright,’ Jensen grumbled, but he shot Cougar an extra big grin before turning to set out his kit.

Disconcerted, Cougar did his own organising. Going into field meant he had to take an entirely different gun, and he took great care hiding his rifle carefully in the brush.

Going into the field meant he’d hear their thoughts as he killed them.

He paused as he realised that, one hand on the open edge of his pack and the other holding a magazine for his pistol.

‘Cougs?’

‘Cougs.’

‘Pooch, what’s his last name?’

‘It’s on his shirt.’

‘Oh. Alvarez!’

Cougar snapped back into reality and found himself staring Clay in the face.

‘You alright?’ _Fuck don’t tell me he’s dead in the brain._

‘Fine.’ He closed his grip around the mag, nearly slipped from his fingers. ‘I’m fine.’

‘You sure, Cougs?’ Jensen had given him a nickname for his nickname. Somehow endearing, instead of irritating. _You look like shit, nearly white, wonder how dark you are next to my skin - shit - I hope he’s not gone, better discharged than here, I’m not letting another one of us die -_

‘Jensen, relax,’ said Cougar. ‘I am alright.’

A slow grin spread wide over Jensen’s face. _Most he’s ever said to me,_ ‘Sweet.’

.

Cougar disobeyed orders. He got between Pooch and Jensen, all the better to hear Jensen’s mind. It raced, it was loud, it was a frantic mix of words and colours.

Clay ran the op unlike anything Cougar had ever been on. More strike force than army, and without most of the safety guards that the army had instilled into him. Basic shit like gun protocol had already been tossed out the window; in the field only Jensen seemed to acknowledge that Clay held any kind of rank, and even the Clay followed Roque’s lead more than he made up his own.

Unconscious, perhaps, a mere whisper of thought in echo of Roque’s, which were muted, like he didn’t want to be thinking at all.

Sometimes Cougar felt he learned people like he was looking at them through a dozen mirrors, everything slightly off from reality but still a perfect copy.

They hightailed it out of there, jeep already loaded with their things, and they drove through the night until they deemed they were safe enough, and then they all fell asleep just as soon as it was decided that Cougar could go on watch first.

He volunteered.

Pooch had been in a sticky spot and Cougar had been standing close enough to hear the guy’s last horrific thoughts as the bullet squelched through his brain.

He’d not yet figured out a way to drown out things he didn’t want to know. Forgetting, it seemed, was not a particular skill of his.

The others were dreaming. They were not pleasant dreams. A kinder man perhaps would have felt empathy or sympathy or _something_ , but Cougar just felt irritated that they intruded on his mind in such a fashion.

When he was quite certain he was right about to pass out from sheer exhaustion he woke Pooch, and didn’t remember falling asleep at all.

In the morning, or mid-afternoon, they drove again. Pooch was at the wheel snacking on candy he’d had in his pack. He’d offered some to Cougar, who could hear that Pooch didn’t really want to share and so had declined, but had not offered any to Jensen, who took some anyway.

‘So, Cougs,’ said Pooch. ‘Where’d you grow up?’ Roque made a noise like a person with a severe gut ailment, coupled with heavy aggressive thoughts towards Pooch for starting a conversation.

‘California.’

‘Is that where you learned to shoot?’

‘No,’ he says, tersely.

_I’ve pissed him off, what a bastard -_

‘I learned in the army,’ he said, trying to cultivate a softer tone. He hesitated, and then asked a question back. He didn’t think he’d ever asked a question in his life, and he didn’t get the inflection right. ‘Where did you grow up.’

‘Lexington for a while, but mostly Philly.’ He paused, and added, ‘That’s where I learned how to shoot.’ _Army or prison, ma said, so here I am -_

‘What about your name?’ Jensen chimed in, overeager to hear the answer. ‘Where’d that come from?’

He tangled through the reasons, dissected out the Spanish, and summed it up as, ‘I’m good at parkour.’

Jensen seemed disappointed, but Cougar was suddenly unable to completely understand what he was thinking. He gave Jensen a bothered look.

_Damn he’s cute -_

He startled back to looking out the windshield.

 

-

 

They stopped in some little town where everyone seemed to speak a very little bit of English, and Clay and Jensen stuck out like infected wounds. Cougar hadn’t brought civvies because he’d never done so before, so he ended up with a loaned shirt from Pooch to hide his army colour so they could all head off to the bar.

Roque settled in a corner with a bottle between himself and Clay, and Cougar watched them a moment trying to figure them out.

‘Stoic and silent,’ Jensen said, into his ear. _And wildly fucked up_. ‘They don’t like letting on they know how to have fun.’ _Roque’s fun is violence which is scary shit -_

‘What are you having?’ Pooch called from the bar.

‘Beer,’ they returned in unison.

Usually Cougar found respite in foreign towns for the language blocking any understanding of thoughts, but here they spoke a type of Spanish and he understood enough through the accent and slang to have it bother him. He took a shot with his beer, and then leaned on the bar frowning at the blank wood in front of him.

A hand slammed on his back and he flinched wildly.

‘Shit! Cougs, it’s just me,’ Jensen cried. _Shit Jake don’t slap an army man c’mon you know shit like this, you goddamn idiot -_

‘Is fine,’ said Cougar.

During the trip Jensen had sat near to him, some kind of vague idea that he needed a buffer to protect against Roque. He was grateful for that; Roque’s thoughts were too far violent to feel comfortable near them for too long.

‘Whatcha thinking about?’

He couldn’t very well explain the truth, but there was a woman across the way thinking about him, so he gestured at her with a finger, rest of his hand still curled around his beer.

‘Thinking about her.’

‘Ah,’ said Jensen. _Don’t suppose there’s any pretty men around -_ ‘You found her fast. Don’t think you could find one for a spazz like me?’ _Goddamnit I shouldn’t have come -_

Cougar relaxed and let the wave of secret conversation drown him slightly. There was a woman thinking about Jensen, mostly in the context of white-boy. Finding the particular person in amongst the cluster of people was more difficult, and then Jensen was talking and thinking right next to him and already Cougar had learned the shape of his thoughts, the distinct tone to those ramblings. He suspected he could pick Jensen out of a million minds.

He didn’t know what he thought about that.

‘See that woman?’

‘Which one?’ _I don’t want a woman, hell, how am I going to get out of this one -_

‘The one in blue.’

 _Time to come clean about how very colour blind I am?_ ‘I don’t know who you’re talking about, and now I’ve lost interest in this game. I’m going to get another beer. Do you want one?’

‘Do you want a man?’

 _What the shit -_ ‘Um....’ Like a deer caught in the spotlight he just stared. ‘Um, no,’ he said. ‘Why would you - no! I’m just… thirsty.’

Cougar had acted before on things he knew only from hearing it thought about. He shrugged. ‘Is no problem.’ He glanced around and with a slight grin said, ‘We might be in the wrong bar.’

Jensen leaned on the bar and leaned very close. His eyes were grey-blue and fierce, and Cougar was reminded of what he often forgot, too close to the situation to see the truth: Jensen was in the army, and Jensen was in the Losers. He knew how to kill people and usually assigned it more glee than was strictly healthy.

 _I will tear out your throat and eat your lungs -_ ‘How do you know?’

With a carefully constructed casual shrug, Cougar said, ‘I just guessed.’

‘No one has ever guessed. How do you know?’

‘I’m a sniper. I’m good at observing.’ With the topic of conversation and Jensen this close to him, smelling like gunpowder and dust and musky sweat, Cougar was remembering himself aged fourteen and crying in the shower after masturbating to the wrong shaped body.

‘I grew up Catholic,’ said Cougar. ‘I’ve never…,’ he stumbled over the words. He looked at his beer and then closed his eyes when that focus didn’t help. ‘I would not be against going to that other bar.’

_No no, if you’re gay and I’m gay no one’s driving the bus and shit this is not going to help -_

‘I’ve never,’ Cougar said again, and left it at that. He’d never done anything about it. He set his hands on the bartop and was surprised to find them slightly shaky.

 _This is too much for one night -_ ‘That was a good bit of bonding. Do you feel bonded now? I feel too bonded to do much else tonight. Let’s drink. You want another beer? Maybe a shot. I’m getting us shots.’ _Maybe we’ll forget any of this happened_.

‘Jensen, I won’t tell anyone.’

‘Yeah, fine, cool. I trust you.’ _Weird. I don’t trust anyone._ ‘I’ve just never had anyone know, you know? Old secrets, kinda got used to it not being secret. Let’s… not talk about this for a while. A few months, if we live that long, okay?’

Cougar thought that was a fine idea. He wasn’t sure if he was okay with anyone knowing anything at all. And this was not even it, the big secret, the one he’d never considered telling anyone. But he looked at Jensen leaning over the bar to tell the woman what he wanted and he considered, fleetingly, that if he were going to tell anyone at all he might tell Jensen.

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As a timeline, this is way way before the comics/movie, and I figure Cougar doesn't have his hat before he joins The Losers.

It was a few days later and they were sitting quiet waiting for orders in a space deemed hostile, do not engage. Fierce they were, but too few to take on the numbers said to be stationed at that base. Jensen was meant to be in the midst of liaising with various spec-ops to hazard a more accurate guess about those numbers, but the room had fallen into silence while Cougar had been struggling to find and keep that meditating doze he’d found was the only thing that kept the thoughts at bay.

He sat up, peered around.

Pooch was sitting a little to the side, occupied in what usually occupied those in the army: sweet fuck all. Not wanting to sound curious, Cougar tried to listen for any hint, but Pooch was only thinking expletives and related emotions. Daringly, Cougar said, ‘Where is Jensen?’

‘Taking stock of the location,’ said Pooch, _gone for a run -_

‘This is hostile territory.’

‘Si,’ said Pooch. _Easier than writing him up for insubordination Clay says -_

‘He does this often?’

‘Sometimes.’ _All the fucking time, surprised he’s not dead yet -_

Cougar didn’t like that at all.

Jensen took nearly three hours to return from the time that Cougar noticed him gone, and during that time Roque and Pooch played four hands of cards, Clay tried to draw Cougar into conversation and gave up when Cougar refused to play along, and Jensen’s computer beeped no less than fifteen times.

When he did come back it was to strip off nearly completely and perform the pathetic replacement for a proper shower. Cougar was well used to male nudity, but he was feeling raw and tense from the conversation a mere few days before, and he found he didn’t know where to look.

‘What’s the news?’ Clay asked.

‘Intel is wrong.’

Roque brightened up. ‘So we can - ’ _\- go and have a little fun in town?_ This thought was sharp like a serrated knife, and Cougar flinched at it.

 _Is Cougs alright?_ ‘Yeah, sir, wrong, but far underestimated. I’d reckon there’s a hundred soldiers in there, plus civvies for support.’ _No cats, scared a couple dogs, weird smells - what do they eat here? Think my blister’s gone! Shit I stink -_

He was down to underwear and socks, and Cougar found the dirt in his nails positively enthralling.

‘I found us a way in but it’s gonna be a tight squeeze.’ _If you want the ‘package’. Sounds like a goddamn video game. Maybe there’s an alternate universe where everything’s normal. I hope other-Jake is an accountant. Balding. Probably has a beautiful house, the fat bastard._

‘Tight for you or tight for Cougar?’ Clay asked. His brain was all business.

 _Cat could do it._ ‘Cougar should manage.’

 _So long as he’s not claustrophobic - ‘_ Cougar,’ _where did he get that name?_ ‘Jensen will show you where to go. We’ll not be close enough to provide proper backup.’

Cougar had always known he’d have to die sometime, and probably soon. He had thought he’d at least know the name of the country he’d do it in.

‘Sir,’ he said. Twice now he’d been sent into a field not in his preferred position. His rifle, never far from his person, was close enough that his finger twitched and touched it.

 _I don’t like him nervous._ This, from Jensen, who was mostly naked and looking at him with more concern than left Cougar comfortable.

 _Tomorrow, early._ ‘Get some rest,’ Clay said. ‘Clocks for oh-three-hundred. Cougar, eat something.’ _You’re too goddamn skinny._

 

-

 

The door was some kind of half-door into a tunnel that might have once been meant for water. The building itself was a kind of fortress, a paranoid person long dead with enough money to lug the stone up from the quarry to make a sprawling house completely enclosed. Now, it was home to a small collection of well-armed personnel, and Cougar got to listen to the receding worried thoughts of his team.

In-building he could hear a handful of different languages: Arabic, of which he knew a smattering; German, which he knew enough to get laid; Portuguese, which he could guess at but would never speak; a cluster of others he didn’t know at all. The more thoughts he could hear the more within the building he knew he was, and while intel had blueprints based on outside sketches and consideration of architecture of the time, no one drawing them had ever been inside.

What he wanted was in a box. The box had been described; the contents had not. He was assured the box was not very large.

Those making the assurances had lied.

It would fit under an arm but would be more comfortably carried by two.

He was crouched in the room trying to figure a way to get it back into the tunnel with him when the door to the corridor opened. He’d just come through that corridor and was certain he’d seen no one at all.

‘Oi!’ one yelled. A universal noise. Cougar grabbed the box and flung it at them both. Now bloodied, he struggled to hold it as he ran.

‘What’s up?’ asked Clay.

‘Cougs, put that larynx to good use. Tell me what’s going on,’ said Jensen.

So odd to hear them speak without the accompanying behind-scenes.

‘Being attacked,’ Cougar said, a hard breath between one word and the next. ‘Going to find a way out.’

‘Well, shit. I don’t have a layout so I can’t direct you. There was a kitchen to the south-west corner. Friendly dog. Can’t tell you much else.’

‘Stow it, Jensen,’ said Clay. ‘Keep us informed.’

‘South corridor,’ said Cougar. He’d found himself in a lovely room, windows and wall hangings and a big table. A meeting room, or a dining room. The door he’d just come through flew open again, and he had to drop the box to grapple with him.

He loathed hand-to-hand. It was more exhausting than it had any right to be, too close, death only inches away. He tried to get his thumbs into the man’s eyes but slipped. All he could hear was a frantic - _oh shit no fuck him die you shit -_ in Portuguese. Terror was a universal language.

He could feel the other reaching for his gun, but Cougar got their first and shot him through the neck. It didn’t kill him right away, and Cougar grabbed the box and stumbled away fast as he could manage.

There was a perimeter to the place that was deemed extremely hostile, do not enter, so when Cougar burst out through a door and leaped over some hedges to find Jensen and Roque staring at him, he nearly shot them out of false instinct.

‘You look like shit,’ _Christ don’t tell me that’s his blood, he looks fine, not gonna be concerned, he’s upright it’s fine it’s fine -_

‘Not my blood,’ said Cougar.

Roque took the box and Cougar didn’t argue.

 _Now we get to get out of - fuc-_ Cougar heard the person that Roque could see and he spun and shot without a thought.

‘Go,’ he said, and ran with them through the gardens.

The chase was a blur of green and dark brown and khaki figures between. A few shots but nothing close. A race of thoughts, like they were words the wind could pick and toss about however it wanted.

They were near clear to cover provided by Clay and a jeep provided by Pooch when Cougar, between Jensen and Roque, stopped dead.

‘What?’ asked Jensen.

‘Party time,’ said Roque, seeing what Cougar already knew.

Clay was a poor shot over a long range but he managed pretty well, kept them alive, while Jensen screamed to Pooch over the sound of bullets to bring the jeep closer, and Cougar anticipated Roque’s movements and kept well clear of him while fighting.

The jeep spun into the clearing.

_In in get in, we gotta go -!_

_Fucking box, better be goddamn worth it -_ Cougar snatched the box off Roque and tossed it into the jeep, leaping in on after it. Then Roque, then Jensen, and the door slammed and they sped off to the harmonious melody of bullets ricocheting off the metal.

‘Why the fuck do you have a hat?’ _you goddamn weirdo -_

Jensen looked down at his hands.

Pooch twisted in his seat and laughed. ‘Gonna be a cowboy?’ _I’d pay to see you on a horse -_

‘It’s for Cougar!’

Two minds went _why?_ and Cougar just stared. He tried to figure a reason out from Jensen’s thoughts but there wasn’t an answer.

‘Why?’

Jensen shrugged. ‘I dunno. Might be lucky?’

There was blood on the hat. It would blend into the brown but for now it was stark red and sliding over the brim.

_Thought you were gonna die._

Cougar looked at Jensen, really looked him in the eye. Blue, with dirt caught in the pores of his face, in the blond stubble. Sweat smeared into mud over his forehead. His hair gone awry from his army-regulations cap. He looked tired, and pure, like he was the best thing Cougar would ever get.

He put the hat on his head, and Jensen grinned all the way to the safe zone.


	4. Chapter 4

Cougar was listening to music, and didn’t hear the argument until he was right on top of it.

_Don’t be a jerk come on it’s so tiny other units have them -_

_I’m going to give in I can’t say no to that face. Why Jensen. Why do I have to deal with him?_

Cougar took one earbud out. ‘What’s the matter?’ he asked, and then he saw it. The cat was no bigger than both his fists put together, and he had small hands, long, delicate fingers that had the priest at his childhood church asking if he'd ever thought to be a pianist.

Pooch was grinning the cheery of grin of one witnessing a combat of wills not his own. 'Jensen found a cat. Colonel doesn't want him to keep it.'

'The Colonel recognises that a cat is not a suitable fit for a unit like ours.'

'Other units have them,' Jensen said. _And I like cats._ 'Look at her!' _I can't leave her here. She'll die and I'll never get over it. Come on Cougar support me._

'We are not like other units,' Clay said.

Jensen was playing with the cat’s paws, and she, being very obliging, was curiously grabbing at them and pulling his fingers closer to sniff and gnaw at them. _Look at you, aren’t you the cutest? I hope I was as cute as you when I was little. Super cute -_

Unable to stand that for very long without doing something monumentally stupid, Cougar said, ‘Keep her.’

 _We can’t keep a cat with this unit_ \- ‘We can’t keep a cat with this unit,’ Clay said.

 _Stop arguing let him keep it when it dies he’ll learn a valuable lesson_ -

‘Roque agrees,’ Cougar said, and, keeping his smile at their shock to nothing more than a little twitch of the corner of his mouth, he went to have a shower after his run.

He couldn’t hear the thoughts of animals. Or, he could, but he couldn’t understand them. They thought in colours and smells and emotions that weren’t human, and in the end it just gave him a headache. That aside, later, while digging into his MRE (a pretense at beef brisket which he generally ate as fast as he could stomach just to get it out of the way), the cat came and sniffed at the toe of his boot and then meowed piteously as he frowned at it. Its thoughts were childishly disjointed and sad enough that he put a bit of food on the end of his fork and held it out.

The cat sniffed it, and meowed again.

Pooch, watching him, said, ‘What are we feeding this thing?’ _Maybe it’ll like my the sauce on this one -_ ‘ Here, Cougs.’ He held out his MRE, and Cougar dipped his fork into the gravy and tried that. The cat licked it all up, only to be disturbed by a sudden flash.

‘Oh my god!’ _the look on your faces! -_ ‘Sorry, sorry,’ said Jensen. ‘I couldn’t not.’

The cat, startled by the flash, raced behind Cougar’s legs.

‘You will have to figure out what we’re going to feed it,’ Pooch said, focused on trying to get the kitten out from hiding.

‘She’s scared,’ said Cougar, and deftly scooped up a bit more gravy to feed her. A startling flurry of thoughts from Jensen made him look up, unable to quite detangle any meaning from the race of words. Suddenly uncomfortable in a way he’d never been before about his ability, he stood up and handed Jensen the fork, careful of where the cat was. ‘She is yours.’

_You don’t want to hang out come on look at those eyes just  - don’t you like cats? Come on man you gotta like cats, if you don’t like cats you sure as hell don’t like me -_

‘Why did Clay let you keep her?’ Pooch interrupted.

‘She’s so cute!’ The kitten had decided Jensen, at least, was not a threat, and was purring a little while licking the gravy.

‘Thought you didn’t like cats.’

‘Don’t trust cats,’ Jensen declared. _But so fluffy oh my god-!_ ‘I couldn’t leave her there.’ He looked up, feigning hurt. ‘You can’t tell me you’d leave her there. You heartless, soulless man, does Jolene know you feel that way?’ And then he started singing. Horrified, Cougar quickly abandoned them, taking his rifle to clean it beside Roque, who was cleaning his knives.

‘What do you think of them?’ Roque asked, gesturing with one such shiny point. _Damn stupid to keep the thing, reminds me of my sister never thinking things through he’s gonna end up the same way as her, wrong man treating him bad -_

Startled, Cougar kept his eyes down, mind racing, heart suddenly heavy in his throat. Roque nudged him, looking for an answer. ‘Doesn’t matter,’ Cougar said.

‘Cat’s not coming stateside with us.’

‘Can leave her at base.’

_Sure guess they’ve had pets before, there was that ugly mutt thing, and there was Trelby’s python. Kept the rats down._

‘Is the python still there?’ Cougar asked, intensely curious.

 _Why the hell are you saying so much I liked you silent, come on man work with me_ ‘The python died last spring,’ Roque said, looking at him a little strangely. ‘Powers ran over it.’ _Fucker says it was an accident but he’s lying I’ll get him back one day -_

Wanting to get along with him Cougar grunted and nodded, and let the thoughts of the room wash over him, and tried not to flinch too hard when Roque’s mind, as usual, turned to the violent.

-

He woke up to a small weight on his chest, a little grumpily. Pooch had been dreaming, and it wasn’t a bad dream, but dream-sharing was discomforting even out of a warzone.

The cat meowed at him. He screwed his eyes tight shut.

‘No,’ he said, with some emphasis.

 _Where’s the cat oh did it leave oh no please don’t tell me it’s run off where is it I can’t call it Cougar’s sleeping and he’d_ kill _me -_

‘Jensen, your cat is on me,’ he said. The cat tried to paw at his moving mouth. He blew out, and it huffed an irritated thought at him.

For a moment there was the warmth of a hand brushing past him, fingers sliding over his chest, and then the cat was picked up and hoisted away.

 _You look so good oh god I just want to kiss you can I kiss you -_ ‘Go back to sleep.’ His hat was balanced over his face to keep the light out of his eyes, and Jensen drifted away thinking cute things about the cat.

-

They left the cat at base, the one where once there’d been a pet python and now there was just a cluster of chickens that didn’t lay pecking about the half cameoed buildings. Jensen was horribly mournful about the whole thing, much more than seemed acceptable, and even Clay got in on trying to cheer him up.

‘You know it had to be done,’ he said.

‘Yeah.’

‘We couldn’t take her with us.’

‘No.’

‘They wouldn’t let her into the country.’

‘I know.’

Clay sighed the weary sigh of someone who had tried everything they knew how to try. ‘Cougar!’ he barked.

Cougar, doing his best to take a nap because he didn’t sleep well when travelling even at the best of times, jerked awake and grabbed his gun. Jensen mentally laughed at his panic, and gave Cougar an apologetic smile, while Cougar tried to settle down, tried to remember they were at base, Stateside, and perfectly safe.

‘Cheer him up.’

Cougar gave him his best ‘who, me?’ look. Clay just narrowed his eyes. ‘He likes you best.’ Cougar attempted alarm. It got him no closer to the goal of being left alone. He missed being left alone. His plan for the evening had been a very loud movie, preferably a spy movie, maybe one of the old Bonds. Something that didn’t involve thoughts, his own or others.

Then Jensen looked at him. The expression reminded him of the cat’s, aware that something was the matter but not aware of his own part in the situation.

Cougar felt his shoulders sag. ‘Okay,’ he said.

Jensen brightened immediately. _You sound pissed off I don’t care I don’t care I’ll cheer you up what will we do let’s do something fun like go-karting I bet you’d drive a mean go-kart. I wanna run or go shooting or something fun let’s do something fun -_

Already with a headache after spending too long around too many people, Cougar resisted the urge to rub his forehead. He had all the Bond movies on his laptop but couldn’t watch that, not without getting good and close to Jensen, and he really couldn’t do that.

 _You alright man?_ ‘You alright?’ Pooch asked.

‘Movies,’ he said, and walked out knowing that Jensen was following, able to tell without turning, and for the first time in years, hating himself a little for this ability no one else seemed to have.

The cinema was old, and playing only one recent movie and the rest were Superman movies of the Christopher Reeve era. The ticketer idly looked them over and figured them for soldiers from the base just up the road, and wondered if they’d killed anyone, and wondered how many people, and Cougar bought a ticket without talking and stalked away.

Jensen bought half the things at the candy bar, including a packet of sour twizzlers that he proceeded to eat by the large handful and moan about painfully as they burned his tongue. There were four other people in the cinema, three together and one an older woman out in a frayed cardigan and sitting all alone with popcorn stinking like butter that she barely touched at all. Cougar curled in on himself and stared intently at the screen, but still couldn’t completely ignore all the thoughts filling the space.

The movie ended and Jensen bounded out the moment the credits started up. ‘Food. Beer.’ _\- pet store find a cat -_ ‘Come on dude. You alright?’

‘I do not want to go to a bar.’

‘Yeah, alright. I just don’t wanna go back to base. Wanna take a walk? See the stars?’ _Shit he’s gonna think I'm hitting on him, talking to guys is easier when they don’t know you’re gay shit shit -_

‘Okay,’ Cougar said, and his headache came back at the weight of joy.

‘Are you alright? You seem to be in a mood. I know I’m really annoying and I’m sorry but I really can’t cope with silence, you know?’ - _hope the cat’s alright -_ ‘If you don’t want to talk about it I can talk about something else.’ - _are you annoyed about me I can leave I don’t want to leave but I can if you asked me I guess -_ ‘I can talk about literally anything. Random Wiki me. See how fast you get to Ancient Greece and philosophy.’

‘Okay.’

 _Really?_ There was a moment of blessed relief, silence, nothing but the road stretching on into the night, lit occasionally by pools of yellow, clouds of bugs heavy around the lights. _Okay okay what do I talk about -_ ‘So you know Memphis, yeah? University of Memphis has itself an art museum. Opened in nineteen-eighty-one,’ he began, and kept talking, and kept talking, rambling from topic to topic, from the art museum to the use of paper in art, to origins of pulping, jumping over to civil engineering and then the shows written by Mark Steel, all connected by tenuous links Cougar didn’t much try to follow.

They walked for well over an hour; that hour bled into two, and they found themselves at the crossroads of a highway and a dirt track with a handmade sign on sunbleached wood, and Cougar stopped. Jensen kept walking, and was midway through a story, mostly anecdotal, about Debbie Barham, someone Cougar had never heard of.

‘What’s the matter?’ _Where are we?_ ‘Guess we should head on back. Feeling better? I can keep going, if you like, but I’ll probably need some water.’

‘I do not mind,’ Cougar said.

_Silence is alright, I suppose. It’s so quiet, and there’s a lot of stars. I wonder what the time is. If I had a nocturnal I could figure it out. I guess? Movie finished at half-nine so it’s midnight? Maybe? If I could find the Big Dipper, dunno where that is, there’s so many stars. Oh, that breeze is nice. I hope Cougar’s alright. Hope the cat’s alright - hope Cougar is alright. Is he just quiet or upset I don’t know I can’t tell I wish I could tell -_

‘It is eleven-forty,’ Cougar said, to interrupt.

‘Oh.’ _Why are you telling me?_ ‘Okay. Thanks.’

 _I really like him and I don’t really know how to tell him? Can I ask him on a date. If I kiss him is this a date?_ He stopped dead. Cougar frowned at him.

‘Something in my shoe,’ he said, and made a good show of unlacing and shaking it out. _I can’t kiss him we’re in the army -_

‘Roque knows.’

Putting the finishing flourishes on the bow in his laces Jensen took a moment before asking, ‘Knows what?’

‘That you’re gay.’

 _Whatwhatwhatthefuck_ \- Cougar recoiled from the panic, clenching hands into fists and gasping through his mouth.

‘How? How do you know?’ _Talking about me why were you talking about me -_ ‘Did he ask? Did you tell?’

‘No.’

_Please use your words what the fuck how does he know this isn’t a joke this better not be a goddamn joke -_

Cougar was regretting it. He’d thought that maybe it would relax Jensen, knowing he didn’t have to hide. He knew he’d relax a good deal more if he knew he didn’t have to hide what he knew.

‘You don’t have to pretend.’

‘Yes, I do! Of course I do, I can’t just, what, be myself? I can’t be like you, Mr Sexy, just acting like myself no matter what’ _\- though you are gay I guess maybe you get it -_ ‘It’s not safe.’

‘I’m not gay.’

 _What?_ ‘What?’ _What are you talking about you said you said -!_

‘I like women, also.’

After half a minute or so they started walking again.

_What am I meant to do with this? Roque knows? I can’t just out myself, I can’t, there’s too much, it’s dangerous, I can’t I can’t -_

‘I did not mean to panic you. I merely thought,’ the English eluded him, a moment, as Jensen’s panicked confusion kept over him in waves. He swallowed. ‘They would not mind.’

‘So you gonna tell them about yourself?’

For a moment Cougar thought he meant tell them about his telepathy, and he stopped and choked on the sudden horror, the sheer, overwhelming terror at such an idea. He would never. Had never. Not even to his mother, not even his favourite uncle, though he had come close once, one weekend walking down to the shops to buy some missing essentials for dinner he had thought that maybe, of everyone, Tío Luis would understand, but he’d choked then, just as he did now.

He’d never told anyone. He would never tell anyone. And standing there beside Jensen he remembered the overwhelming loneliness of being the only one.

‘Yeah,’ Jensen said. ‘Thought so.’ _Can’t tell anyone my secrets I can’t it’s not safe this is easier I’ll just…_ Jensen looked up at the stars. _Really sick of being alone._ ‘They’ll be wondering where we are.’


	5. Chapter 5

He had the headache the next day, and over the next few days. It kept him readily frustrated and running long, off-track routes that took him far over hills and technically trespassing. A benefit, of course, was knowing in advance if there was a farmer close by and about to yell at him for being on property unwelcomed.

They were amalgamated into the company stationed at the base, broken up and individually set with different units within. They stuck out like sore thumbs, The Losers did, not bothering to get along, more willing than the regular army grunt to show off, show that sure they’d been shunted off and expected to die but they’d kept living.

Cougar was set to a course and told the time he had to beat to pass the training. He heard the scoffing of the unit, and, feeling a little bored by the whole thing put in only just enough effort to properly impress. Clay, off talking with some other member of the brassery, levelled a stare that seemed to criticise him for not showing off to his full effort, but that was left to Jensen, who ran the course that same afternoon and beat the time by three minutes, which had Pooch joking that Cougar needed to give up the nickname.

They weren’t really talking to each other. The others hadn’t noticed because Cougar didn’t talk much at all, and Jensen kept talking, but he didn’t talk to Cougar, who didn’t immediately notice because he kept hearing Jensen, words and thoughts, and even if he couldn’t pick everything up, Jensen’s mind a cacophony he couldn’t begin to detangle, he was always aware. Jensen was always present.

And then a week into training they finally had a Sunday off, the morning relatively quiet for Church-goers and general relaxation, he looked about and realised Jensen was nowhere to be seen.

He waited for Pooch to think about Jensen instead of asking outright, and was told he’d gone for a run. Not unusual, but bored and lonely Cougar went out with the intention of finding him but did not, and this pattern continued over the next few days, even as the Losers did training as a unit and the other soldiers scoffed at Clay, with his silver leaf, who joined them in running drills: Jensen was present but not, and completely absent when he could be, and while they’d been alone together numerous times before now they never were, not even for a moment, not even in passing.

More than a little hurt but having never had a proper friend to know how to approach it, Cougar let it be. He played darts with Roque and COD with Pooch, and let Clay show him off, shooting targets at one thousand yards; one and a half; two.

He enjoyed shooting things. This, his greatest sin: he could feel the wind, knew how it would touch the bullet, knew the shape of the land even if he’d only seen it on a map. He rarely hit more than an inch or two out of bullseye, and even on a day with gale warnings he would have completed the mission, if the metal target was flesh and blood.

The Losers had precious little to be proud of, and he felt Clay’s boasting like an embarrassed child, just doing what he felt was natural and a little bewildered to know that it was not.

And then Jensen came to find him.

Cougar had earphones on and music loud, and a trashy spy novel in hand, the last few pages under his butt because they kept falling out but he couldn’t lose them.

Despite the sensory distraction he still heard Jensen come up beside him, mind racing and none of it thoughts that Cougar could pick out. Nervousness.

‘Cougs? Hey,’ Jensen said, and sat down next to him, close enough that their trousers touched and Cougar had to keep his elbows where they were to avoid hitting Jensen in the ribs. ‘I’m not one of those people who doesn’t know their own feelings, alright? I’m not in denial, but I can’t do this,’ - _don’t ask don’t tell don’t ask don’t tell don’t tell -_ ‘We’re at war. Not presently,’ he waved a hand at the compound, dirt and grey grass and blue skies brushed with a breeze slightly the wrong side of cool. ‘But us, the United States of America. Just because our little unit wouldn’t care doesn’t mean it would be easy and I can’t stop lying.’ _Can’t tell anyone not ever don’t ever tell anyone -_ ‘So let’s… No more gay talk. Okay? Pierce Brosnan is an attractive motherfucker but you didn’t hear it from me. I like the army.’ _\- don’t know what I’ll do when I have to leave sign on again I’ll never be promoted I’ll probably die in this uniform -_

‘Okay.’

 _Seriously you’re going to let this go I didn’t think - you’re like a dog with a bone -_ ‘For real?’

Cougar winced a little at the turn of phrase. ‘For real.’

‘You’re a champ,’ _and I probably love you -_

They both drew in a sharp breath. The silence between them turned awkward.

‘Um, so, my sister’s here. You can come meet her?’ _What am I doing?_ ‘Clay gave me the afternoon off base.’ _Say yes don’t say yes I don’t know oh fuck_ \- ‘I bet you could get a pass easier than I could.’

‘No,’ Cougar said. He couldn’t pick relief or disappointment from the wash of thought that burst, sudden. ‘You go.’

Jensen didn’t leave immediately. ‘She drove out here specially for me. Cougs, can I -?’ _Don’t ask -_ ‘Where’s your family?’ _Stupid stupid stop talking -_ ‘They never come.’

‘I’ve killed over ninety people,’ Cougar said. When Jensen looked at him with a blank lack of understanding, he unwillingly added, ‘They don’t talk to me.’

_Oh my - come with me come hang out with me and Jess she can be your family she’s great at being family -_

‘Go,’ said Cougar, and put the earbud back in and reopened his book, and resolutely ignored Jensen until he had gone away. Only, once he had gone he couldn’t focus on the novel, and kept finding himself staring off into the distance.

He understood, of course, the danger of telling secrets. There weren’t just the big two, there were others, military secrets, and secrets he kept from the military, those little breakages in protocol or proper procedure, the times he hadn’t killed someone he’d been meant to kill and times he’d killed the wrong person. Times people, their own people, had died because of him. Behind his lips he had a wealth of words he would never let out. But still, despite everything, he still had the passing fancy that he’d one day find someone he could tell them all to.

He’d always thought he was resigned to the silence, hearing more than he ever said, knowing things people never wanted to share.

But right then, sitting against a wall with his pant legs rolled up to catch the sun, book open on his lap and hair tickling his neck in the wind, he hated what life he’d been dealt, and he felt lonely, and he wanted to throttle someone over the sheer, exhausting unfairness of it all.

 

-

 

Jensen came back with a sprained ankle, scratches all over his arms and legs, and a delighted grin that didn’t go away even when Pooch got aggressive with the gauze and anti-bacterial wipes.

‘What did you do?’ Pooch asked. He fumbled for tweezers; Cougar handed them over before he asked. ‘See this -?’ He held up a sharp bit of tree a full inch in length.

‘Ow,’ Jensen said, pointedly.

 _You deserve it -_ ‘This is a thorn. Did you climb a tree?’

 _Maybe -_ ‘No.’ _Yes -_

 _If this gets infected we’re gonna be grounded and Roque will be mad -_ ‘If this gets infected we’re leaving you behind.’

‘No, you won’t,’ _would you?_ ‘You need the tech guy,’ _I guess I could do everything from here but you can’t leave me behind please don’t leave me -_ ‘You’re worrying about nothing, Pooch. I never get injured.’

‘Your ankle is the size of a football.’ _A small football_ \- ‘I hope you had fun.’

‘So much fun.’

Cougar had thought he’d gone out with his sister, and while he didn’t doubt Jensen’s ability to get into absurd amounts of trouble even with supervision the extent of the scratches was a little confusing. He was tempted to actually voice the question but Jensen’s mind stopped him.

_A great run just like when we were kids I love it here maybe next time she can bring Beth when she’s old enough it’ll be great -_

 

-

 

There was a constant flow of new soldiers on the base, which was more of a brief stopping point for people coming into the country, or people going out. The airfield was hectic, and Cougar kept coming across people who were lost. He never helped them, but he took to avoiding the hallways, taking the long way round to avoid hearing their frantic worry. Grown soldiers shouldn’t get lost on base.

There was a bar off base and with Clay as their dubiously appointed CO they got to go more often than not, passes handed out easily as candy, except to Jensen, who was made to argue his case. Clay always intended to let him have it, but liked to watch him squirm.

The township was pretty small and the bar with its reputation as an army watering hole meant it was frequented by men and women looking for a one night stand. Easy pickings, even for Jensen, who put his foot in it more often than not, and even for Pooch, who wasn’t looking at all but enjoyed the attention and usually spent the time texting Jolene.

They’d been told they were going to get their marching orders in a day or two, meaning this was their last night at the bar. It had been two days since Jess had come to visit, and two days since Jensen had vetoed any conversation about men, and attraction to them.

Cougar went to the bar with a few condoms in his pocket and a plan to enjoy himself. Jensen went into the bar, stopped dead in front of Pooch, who let out a cry of annoyance and jabbed him in the back. Jensen ignored him, marched up to a group of soldiers in the corner and punched a sargent square on the jaw.

The fight was more confusing than epic. Roque was the only one of them with the sheer size and strength, and he struggled to haul Jensen off the other guy, who was fighting back with doggish determination.

‘What the hell?’ Pooch yelled. Roque still had both arms around Jensen but he was still flailing. _You stupid shit you’ll get reported Clay doesn’t need to deal with this I don’t need to deal with this -_ ‘What did he do to you?’

‘My bar,’ said Jensen, when he said anything at all, and it was more a growl than words and his thoughts were a muddle and the next day they shipped out and Cougar was antsy, perhaps because he liked having sex before leaving, it was a little bit superstition and a little bit sense, needing some human contact to settle his nerves and remind himself of the whys of his job. But he was also antsy because Jensen had been hell bent on killing a guy by punching, and for no reason at all.

And he knew that Jensen was hankering on killing him. He could hear it. He just didn’t know why.

Cougar had eight-four kills to his name on the unofficial-official list the army pretended like it didn’t keep, and a few more on his mental tally, and he needed to press his tongue to the roof of his mouth to keep from vomiting at the taste of Jensen’s mind.

A curse. This thing was a curse.


	6. Chapter 6

Cougar listened to Jensen carefully after that. Did his best to take the bed closest to him to hear his dreams. Watched him sideways as they showered in the pathetic stalls offered them. And when they shipped out four days later, he sat next to him on the plane, sat so close that their legs were touching and whispers of Jensen’s voice could be heard even over the rattle and roar of the Boeing.

The mission went on, and on, and on. They set down meaning to get up the next day before dawn, but when Roque went on watch a message came through telling them to stay put. That 2:34am message became a constant in their life for the next seven weeks. Cougar began waking up to the beep of it, half out of a nightmare not entirely his own, to listen to someone press ‘Receive’, and type back, ‘Affirmed’.

They had enough space to walk out of hearing distance from each other, but not visual distance, and to avoid hearing anything at all Cougar had to get right to the edge of the zone deemed safe, hunker down against a wall half gone and pitted with machine gun fire. At four, twelve, and seventeen hundred there was always a missile or explosion or gunfire, but the rest of the time it was random.

They were waiting for backup, probably, support from the air or the ground to help clear a way through, but wires got crossed or someone just couldn’t be fucked, and the Losers got to sit scarcely in safety while they waited.

One morning Cougar woke to gunfire more intense than usual. Keeping down but blinking at the dawn sun, he watched as Pooch and Jensen each fashioned themselves a face on the end of a stick.

_\- this is gonna be awesome, wish I had more colours, she needs makeup -_

They belly-crawled to the north-eastern edge of their perimeter.

 _What the fuck are they doing now, kids in a playground, Clay’s gonna kill them -_ Cougar looked up and met Roque’s eye, who gave a wry grin back. _Least it’ll be interesting I guess -_

Cougar looked to Clay, who was buried in his sleeping bag so not even his hair was visible, but based on his thoughts he was more awake than he was willing to be.

Pooch and Jensen had reached the edge of their space, and tentatively they lifted their drawn-up faces. When nothing immediately happened Jensen pouted and Pooch danced his around.

There were two sudden shots nearly in sync and one of the bullets flew over Cougar’s head.

‘Holy shit!’ Jensen yelled. Pooch hastily shushed him.

‘Well done, Losers,’ Roque said, once they’d returned. ‘Now they know where we are.’

‘You were complaining just yesterday that it was getting boring,’ Jensen said, jabbing him in the chest. They were still both lying down, Roque on one elbow looking down at Jensen lying on his back, and it made such a strange image that Cougar felt a hysterical laughter in his throat. He swallowed it, and waited for Clay to come up for air so he could tell them to fuck orders, they’d go do what they were flown here to do.

-

Truth be told, Cougar wasn’t sure if any of the Losers were his friends before that mission. It went on for another two months, then a three-day reprieve, and another three and a half months doing nearly the same thing. Waiting, waiting, pushing, getting shot at - getting actually shot, in the case of both Pooch and Roque - and moving forward. The rebels knew the territory better and weren’t a single analogous group. The Losers would move a mile east and find themselves surrounded. As much as Jensen tried to quote Band of Brothers it never got easier, never got happier.

After seven months going state-side didn’t seem real.

But after seven months of listening to their thoughts but better, more, having them at his side as he bled and sweated and did his best not to go insane from hearing them all the time, they were more friends than he’d ever had before in his life. They got state-side, and they all bundled up together in the same dorm, unable to fathom being apart.

Cougar listened to them, almost fond, and when he left to have a shower he couldn’t hear them, couldn’t hear them at all.

It was Pooch who found him shaking and shivering, underwear still on but nothing else. Cougar reached for him with his mind and his hands.

‘You alright?’ _God you are going insane we’re all going to be insane none of us will be good for anything we’re going to die here we’re going to die here -_

‘Tell me something good.’

 _There’s nothing good nothing good at all, I’d rather be back there but I’d rather be nowhere -_ ‘I ever told you about how I met Jolene?’

Cougar found enough of himself to be able to scoff at that suggestion. ‘Course.’

‘Then I’ll tell you about my first ever crush. Her name was Amalie.’

Cougar tried to swallowed the choking sensation doing its best to overwhelm him and simply clung on.

-

Cougar, never being much for talking, and unable to concentrate properly on anything when near people, took to listening to the Losers’ thoughts. Daydreams, especially, were his favourite, and Pooch was good at them. Casual fantasies of taking his family away - three imagined kids, a dog, a cottage in the mountains hired out for the summer. A lake to swim in, a little row-boat. Beer in one hand and his wife’s hand in the other.

Roque had nightmares, which kept Cougar up. Jensen had nightmares, too, but they never made any sense, greyscale and stinking. More than a few flickering thoughts had left Cougar sure than Jensen was mostly colour-blind.

Things got better. They had two weeks on base and then they get leave, and Cougar was feeling better enough to go west, far west, ending up in California where he didn’t need to talk to anyone at all. There were rocks, which he climbed, and it reminded him of a home he never had, desert all around and a pub where everyone spoke Spanish. The air was hot and dry, and Cougar grew up in a city but being there made him almost believe he didn’t.

He got a call from Clay a week in.

‘This isn’t me calling you back.’ Cougar sort of hmm-ed. ‘But there’s a lot of talk and probably we’re going to be sent back out in a week. Maybe less. You better still be fit.’ Cougar, never good at phone calls, never good at talking where he couldn’t hear the thoughts behind, grunted. ‘Say goodbye to your family and come home.’

Cougar was in a bar waiting on his lunch from the kitchen and unable to understand the language of the guy in the booth across from him enough to guess the nature of his interest.

‘Okay,’ he said, and hung up.

His hands were shaking. He tried to drink his beer but he spilled it. He knew, of course. He knew. He'd go back tomorrow or in a month. He'd be back on the other side of that rifle watching blood and bone fly into the air. There was a bullet out there with his name on it, and he'd been lucky, so far. He'd been so lucky. His hands were still shaking when he took the stranger back to bed, unable to understand his thoughts and too frayed at the edges to try to understand his voice through the accent. He just wanted the contact. Just needed something living beneath his hands. It was the first man he'd been with since his teenager years, and the sex was good but strange, too unfamiliar in too many ways to be entirely comfortable. He left early, and slept poorly, but woke wanting to do it again, only better. 

He went back to base early to save money; it was old instinct, his bank account with a very good interest rate piling up for a rainy day, knowing, of course, that probably he’d be dead before then. His will left it to his family. Rejected or not, he still hunted them down on Facebook and tried to guess at how happy they were based on what little he could see through the privacy settings.

Roque met him with a hearty slap on his back, and Jensen grinned wide-mouthed and carefree before stealing his chocolate to happily munch on. They went to the bar and played pool and darts, and ran training routines together, and when Pooch came back he fitted in as easily as if he'd never been gone. They talked about nothing serious but they joked and bickered, and Cougar remembered his siblings doing the same but never quite being able to join in. Here, they didn't even demand that he talk. He grinned and tugged on his hat and shook his head, but spoke maybe three words an hour, and yet... And yet. 

He went back to base, and felt like he was going home.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so grateful to everyone reading this, and everyone who comments prompts me to Get On It and write the next chapter. I haven't been super involved in this fandom but I have to say its one of the nicest, politest fandoms I've experienced. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy this chapter, short though it may be, and I solemnly swear not to leave it too horribly long between updates.

‘You ever thought about having kids?’ Jensen asked. This was apropos of nothing, just idle conversation waiting for a plane in Germany to take them back home.

‘Sorta,’ said Pooch. Cougar snorted from beneath his hat, tipped over his head as he pretended to doze. ‘What?’

‘You want three.’

Jensen chortled. _Love that you always know everything -_ ‘You can’t hide from Cougar, man.’ _Seriously, how, does Pooch keep a diary?_

‘No diary,’ Cougar, said, for the hell of it, to see the shock on Jensen’s face. ‘And I didn’t hack his email,’ he added.

_I wasn’t even going to ask that, how did you know I was going to ask that -_

‘You?’ Pooch asked.

‘Me?’ Jensen was lost in thought, and Cougar was lost in listening. _Oh, kids_. ‘Kids? You’re kidding, aren’t you.’ _Haha kid -_ ‘I’d be rubbish as a dad. Really, really bad eggs. If you guys didn’t tell me what to do I’d forget my own gun.’ _Imagine me as a dad, I’d let them eat sugar and red food dye or whatever else is bad for humans -_

‘Is true,’ Cougar said agreeably.

‘You’re not meant to agree with me,’ Jensen said, though his thoughts said the opposite, and Cougar felt the echo of a warm, comforting flush over his skin.

 _You’d probably be a great dad -_ ‘You’ve got time. What’ll you do when this is over? How much longer do you guys have in?’ _One year five months and then I am a free man-!_

Cougar knew but refused to say, the number frighteningly short.

‘I dunno, two years?’ said Jensen. _One year Christ on a cracker when did I get so old -_

‘You’re both still young.’

 _You’re younger than me -!_ Jensen thought.

‘Got plenty of time to find someone,’ Pooch confirmed, in that self-satisfied manner of someone already very happy with his lot of life.

Jensen laughed, mind and voice. ‘What? Who would find me?’ _I’d have to tell them everything and no one would want me -_

‘Jensen’s right,’ Roque offered. ‘We’re army trash. No one’s gonna want to bother with us.’

‘Jolene - ‘

‘Jolene is a fucking prince charming. None of us have her to go home to. Best we’ve got is a lifetime of therapy.’

‘Find someone in the army?’ Pooch tentatively suggested.

Roque snorted. _Fucking married folk have no idea what it’s like -_ ‘Find who in the army? We’re the Losers. You see any of us wearing medals? Our best bet is a bad chicken dinner.’ _You better realise we’re all gonna die trying to get you home because you were fool enough to go and get goddamn married -_

‘Jolene’s a sweetheart,’ Jensen said, ‘but she’s one in seven billion.’ _No one would stay with me after I told them everything -_

Cougar, still hiding under his hat, made a face into the darkness. He could only agree. There were the regular-person issues, his family, his aggressive introversion; the army, and all that it involved, the nightmares and the blood so thick on his hands it had soaked beneath his skin; and the telepathy.

He couldn’t fathom telling anyone that. His tongue didn’t know how to speak the words.

‘Anyway,’ Jensen said, sudden. ‘I’m gay.’

 _Ha! Knew it!_ Roque crowed.

‘What?’ Pooch was struggling to an upright position. ‘Since when?’ _How did I miss it is he into me what if he’s been checking me out - fuck - !_

‘Calm down,’ Clay said, finally joining in. ‘He’s not into you.’

 _How do you know - ?_ ‘Why the hell not?’ _I’m not good enough for him -?_

 _Why the hell did I say that where’s the nearest exit oh Lord I need to be on a plane with them for the next billion hours -_ ‘I don’t know what Jolene’s been telling you, but your ass isn’t that great.’

'How long have you been gay?'

'Not since I was born because I disagree with the idea that you need to be "born this way" to be real, and I totally had a crush on Isabella in preschool because she had the prettiest hair and sometimes let me play with it, but I've been gay since I knew what gay was.' _Shut up you're rambling -_

‘I’ll put you in a class on observation when we get back to the real world,’ Clay said, to Pooch.

_I haven’t been that obvious -_

'He's been pretty fucking obvious,' Clay finished.

‘Calm down,’ Cougar said. Then, needing eye contact, he raised his hat and lifted himself up on one elbow.

‘Don’t give me that look.’ _Okay I could have told them ages ago and not stressed but -_

There was an announcement, loud, calling them over to their jet. They collected their bags, Jensen complaining loudly about how much gear he had, as if it weren’t his own fault for stocking up on tech useless to their mission.

‘One day I’ll need it,’ Jensen said, ‘then you’ll eat your words. Oh Roque, you’ll tell yourself, if only I offered to carry that bag but I didn’t and it fell and it smashed and -’

‘I will never say that,’ Roque said.

‘Help him with his shit,’ Clay said.

‘You never told him to before.'

 _Usually Pooch would do it but he's having a gay-scare -_ Clay thought.

'Is this because he’s gay? Gay men aren’t weak, you know,’ Roque said.

‘I take offence,’ Jensen said, doing his best impression of a limp-wrist, coupled lisping voice.

Clay pushed past him. ‘I take offence of that on behalf of the entire gay community,’ he said. ‘Pack up, the plane won’t wait.’

Roque hefted up one of Jensen’s bags like it weighed nothing. ‘Who’s the cutest boy?’

 _You cannot be asking me that -_ ‘Not you,’ he snarked.

‘Fucking liar, is what you are,’ Roque muttered.

Cougar fell in step beside Jensen, and let their bags bump each other. ‘Told you,’ he murmured.

‘Yeah, alright,’ Jensen agreed.

Up ahead, Pooch’s whirling thoughts came to a sudden screeching stop. ‘You know you can adopt kids.’

‘What?’

‘Queers can adopt.’

Jensen honest-to-god growled. Cougar was properly impressed, and Roque huffed a snort indicating the same.

 _Holy shit_ \- ‘I mean gay people. Gay people can adopt.’ _Can’t they?_ ‘So you can still have kids.’

‘I’d still be the worst father you’ve ever seen.’

 _You ain’t seen mine -_ Cougar got a sudden headache; Pooch and Roque’s thoughts mingled perfectly with his own.

‘But you can have kids,’ Pooch said, determined.

‘In a theoretical world where I’m a completely different person, sure,’ Jensen acquiesced. ‘I can have kids.’

‘See?’ Pooch said, and grinned all the way home.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The final chapter. Thanks for sticking with me through this all. I hope you enjoy.

Pooch had a flight out the evening of the day they got home, long enough for him to dump the more sensitive equipment, shower, and get nervous about missing his plane. Commercial, and a connecting flight in the middle that left him getting home the wrong side of midnight.

It was subdued, as it always was, between those left. Too tired to contemplate going out but too awake to simply crash, Roque and Jensen went to the on-base cinema and Cougar found himself a corner far enough away from everyone that his mind was, for a few hours, blessedly silent.

When he got back Jensen was nearly all the way ready for bed, only his tinted glasses and boxer shorts on. As was his habit now, Cougar looked quickly away and busied himself with awkward focus on readying himself. Not that Jensen was paying attention, all of his focus on his laptop, mind hectic with the joy of having complete and proper access to the internet again.

Lying down with the lights off didn’t slow his mind any, and Cougar resigned himself to a restless sleep. Mostly useless energy about wanting to see his sister and his niece, and idle contemplation about what he’d seen on the internet, that morphed into remembering the conversation that morning, or yesterday, depending on the time zone, and so that slid comfortably into meandering wonderings about if and when he’d be able to have sex with the unit knowing – and Cougar was too used to these kinds of thoughts to be exactly guilty about overhearing them, but he wished Jensen would find some other topic to consider – when Jensen blurted, ‘do you reckon Pooch is getting Jolene pregnant like, right now?’

Cougar couldn’t help his startled, ‘what?’

‘I’m just, you know. Thinking about sex.’ _And now you’re thinking about sex but not in a good way –_ ‘Not them having sex! But like, sex.’ _In general just general sex you know – now you think I’m into Pooch –_ ‘And how I’ll never. Um. You know how Pooch was talking about kids? And I’ll never have any.’

‘He is right. You can adopt.’

 _I’m not even that disappointed I love Beth I don’t need another kid in my life – shut up Jensen just say good night –_ ‘I guess. But if what Roque is saying is true about our getting a bad conduct discharge as our best bet, then maybe I won’t ever get approved? I don’t even know what I’d do out there,’ he finished in a huff.

‘Computer stuff.’

 _Of course computer stuff why are you talking about this Jensen -? You have a plan for when you leave and it’s a good plan, it’s a get rich at a comfortable pace plan and it’s gonna work –_ ‘Do you want kids?’

Cougar snorted in disbelief. ‘You are joking, yes?’

‘You’d be a great father.’ _He could be I think I don’t know what makes a good father -? I sure as shit don’t know –_

‘I do not think so.’

Unable to figure a response to that Jensen said nothing at all, and the pace of his thinking slowed enough that Cougar thought perhaps he was going to drift into sleep. Then he got a whiff of a thought not entirely appropriate and went still all over. Then he sagged, and held in a heavy sigh that threatened to escape. Another thing he couldn’t escape, and usually one he just did his best to ignore, but with Jensen in the room, and so close, it was rude on Jensen’s part and far more than merely _uncomfortable_ on Cougar’s.

‘You still awake?’ Jensen asked softly. _What are you doing don’t talk to him when you’re jerking off –_ The bedsheets rustled with the haste with which he removed his hand.

‘Yes,’ said Cougar, unwillingly.

‘You ever thought, ’ – _don’t do it don’t do it you colossal idiot –_ ‘I mean, you’re um. You’re into guys, or whatever,’ _– please for the love of god shut up –_ ‘Ever thought about having sex with me?’ This final part all in a rush of air.

Cougar tried to shut out the immediate panic from Jensen’s side of the room. The truth was no, and yes, but mostly no. He’d considered it at a distance, obliquely, like it wasn’t really him and Jensen acting as the involved parties.

‘No,’ he said. ‘Not really.’

‘Oh.’ _Well duh your best friend isn’t gonna want to bone you come on get a grip –_ ‘Well, um. Do you want to?’

With the knowledge that Jensen was hard, and it was late, and they were tired, and Jensen was feeling vulnerable and nervous and lonely, Cougar wanted to but did not want to. He needed to think about it more, first. Consider if it was a good idea. Sex with strangers, Cougar could do that, but sex with a friend…

‘I don’t know.’

Jensen let out a shaky laugh. ‘Right. Hah. Of course. I’m uh, going to go to the bathroom.’ – _Idiot -! Now he knows you’re going to go jerk off._

‘I really just haven’t thought about it,’ Cougar insisted, though he didn’t know why. He didn’t want Jensen hanging on some false hope. He didn’t know if the hope would be false. He didn’t know what he wanted at all, had never really thought that it would be an offer on the table.

His heart was in his mouth and beating heavy on his tongue.

‘Yeah, I hear you,’ Jensen said, fast and nervous. ‘Still gotta piss.’

Left alone with nothing but the echoing dreams of the people in the rooms round about, Cougar managed to get himself to sleep before Jensen returned. He had a weird dream, where he was making out with Draco Malfoy only for a giant cat to fall out of the sky and tell him, in a deep, steady voice, that he had a twin brother who was waging war on the kingdom.

 

-

 

Leave, a holiday of sorts, four people at the airport wanting to thank him for his service to the country, and then he was back at base and training. Clay tried paring him with various options for spotter, but as always it came back to Jensen as the best option, the one that worked best with Cougar’s silence and telepathy, thoughts cast in a wide-enough net with enough calmness to them that it kept Cougar steady to shoot despite wind and motion and distance.

The training was more intense this time around, and he didn’t need to know Clay’s thoughts to know that the next trip out was going to be him a mile away from the target with nothing but his gun and only one chance to make the shot.

The night before they shipped out they went to bed early and sensibly sober; it was the night before the night before that they went out. They kept it sensible, no fights, not much drinking, just a few beers and Jensen trying to recall the rules of snooker enough to explain it to them.

Towards the end of the night, none of them quite ready to give into the time on their pass and return to base, they sat nursing their last beers, lost in their thoughts, Cougar lost in theirs.

_No one’s mentioned that I’m gay I thought everything would change but it hasn’t which is nice – Cougar was right, he’s always right, maybe he’s magic – it’d be pretty cool if he was a wizard – they could be real who knows – wonder what kind of magic he’d be good at – would he be an earth bender or an air bender -? They’re opposites it shouldn’t be so difficult to figure out –_

_Weird place to go on a first date, don’t think those people are married – maybe she’s a consult, doesn’t look army – were a few air force on base but she doesn’t look that either – least everyone’s being sensible tonight – don’t need to talk Jensen out of a court martial again –_

_Clay’ll be mad if I get another beer but this isn’t enough if I wanna sleep tonight, never sleep proper on base, too many strangers – Wonder if Anna ever tried to write me again – should have written her back I guess just never find the words – Not that I care, guess I should care – couldn’t be here if I cared too much about other people –_

_But if Roman Pearce was told that the guy owns Brazil why did he leave? Can you own Brazil? Why was he surprised when Dominic told him they’d get like a hundred million if originally he thought that the guy owned fucked Brazil -?  And I get why they brought Letty for Fast & Furious 6 but I don’t get why Shaw employed her even though she did have amnesia –_

Cougar leaned back in his seat feeling warm all over, safe and comfortable like he only felt when hearing their thoughts all mingling in his brain.

He knew, of course, what they were going to do before they did it. Knew before Clay even thought the words in their vicinity; Cougar hadn’t been playing on the long-range for the hell of it. The target’s house had a mile of space about it that wasn’t touchable, and the closest vantage point was one-point-three miles away. Cougar had done longer shots, and shots with more danger to them, but they weren’t sending the Losers in because it was a milk run. There was danger there unheard of, intel scant and satellite fuzzy.

Cougar had been sitting pretty for fair on five hours when he finally had a shot of more than one target. There were three, and he couldn’t drop one without doing the others in quick succession, but near the end of the day they all traipsed outside to frown at something in the garden. It looked so heart-wrenchingly normal that his finger paused on the trigger, but not for long. With Jensen reading numbers into his ear he killed them each, easy as pie.

Then they scarpered.

They were legging it through the jungle, the whole team, when shots rang out and Jensen screamed. Cougar was behind by several hundred paces, and putting on an extra surge of speed got him only close enough to see Roque kneeling and bleeding but with a bazooka on his shoulder.

_I can’t I’ll kill them but goddamn –_

‘Roque,’ Cougar said.

 _Shit quiet as a cat you are –_ ‘Let’s go get them.’

On foot and unable to hide anywhere off the dirt road they followed the tire prints as quickly as they were able.

Cougar heard the first murmur of a mind before they saw a person and he grabbed Roque by the elbow. ‘Stop,’ he said. He listened. ‘Two people. To the left, ahead about a hundred yards.’

Between them was a little hill, high enough that they couldn’t see the other side, and they belly-crawled up it, crept into the little tent pitched on the other side, and quietly killed the occupants.

_We shoulda waited for night – too exposed – couldn’t wait that long we gotta get them now –_

Cougar got the drop on a soldier before he rounded the corner, grabbed him down and held him down until he stopped squirming.

_Aw shit this is not good this is not good, is that Pooch that better goddamn be Pooch – if I shift just a little just a very little maybe I can get my – oh fuck fuckfuck never gonna do that again – okay okay – Think Jensen – I’m gonna die in these fucking handcuffs I guess –_

_Calm down you stupid shit they’re gonna come get us – it’s only been a few minutes –_

_Trust Roque trust Roque –_

‘Ahead,’ Cougar said. ‘They’re in the tent ahead.’

 _Fucking creep how do you know –_ ‘Me first,’ Roque said, and Cougar fell in behind him, creeping along the edges of tents, the encampment only semi-permanent, some proper structures but mostly ready to be picked up and moved quick as could be.

Warned by Clay’s thinking Cougar whirled left soon as they got into the tent. He grabbed the soldier, strangled him unconscious, and helped Roque with the others.

 

-

 

They were late to the rendezvous by more than five hours, meaning they got to sit and wait for another bird to come pick them up.

Jensen kept looking at Cougar, but Cougar couldn’t pick his thoughts. Couldn’t, again, and this feeling inside was turning into frustration. He wanted to grab Jensen and shake him and –

Cougar looked at his hands, which were remarkably steady in the light of that sudden realisation.

With dust and dirt and danger so close all around it was hardly the time. The revelation could wait until after a shower and after safety. He could hear Pooch and Roque and Clay but he couldn’t hear Jensen, and he looked up again in nervous need to check that he was still present.

He was, and he was watching Cougar with an unrecognisable expression, and unreadable thoughts.

Cougar looked back at his hands. Safer. Less terrifying.

 

-

 

Dinner was big as they could wrangle on a front-line base, food nearly real and the local brand of cola sickly sweet and gulped by the gallon. Showered, and having sat silent through a meeting where he was thanked for his work, thanked again for the rescue, and informed that the army recognised his efforts but would not, again, be formally recognising them in any kind of award capacity, Cougar got to dinner late and found that Jensen had kept a plate of the best bits aside for him.

So Cougar was probably in love with him.

He needed to say something but couldn’t say something and expect anything in response without telling him the rest of it.

He brushed his teeth and changed into sleeping pants and long-sleeved shirt, the rooms scant on heating and them in the overflow building, eight beds to a room and them the only two in there, a situation that Cougar didn’t properly realise until he stood in the doorway and saw that the only light was the lamp by Jensen’s bed. Jensen was at his locker putting away his boots and jacket, and Cougar suddenly couldn’t stand the distance between them.

‘Hey,’ said Jensen. ‘Nice that we get to be in our own beds tonight. Well, not our own, but you know. Just us two to here, none of Roque’s snoring, that’s gotta be a reward of some kind. You still not getting a medal?’

‘No.’

‘They’re gonna have to tell us one day that we’re doing good.’ _Fucking one day we’re nearly dead out there every single goddamn time –_

‘I don’t mind,’ Cougar said, though he did, a little. Other people got recognition for less, and all he got was a boring-ass meeting with COs who spoke English in an accent he didn’t ever bother to try to figure out.

Jensen closed his locker and leaned against it. There was some kind of fuzz in the air. Cougar couldn’t hear properly, his own thoughts or Jensen’s, words lost to some tasteless grey. And he couldn’t look away from Jensen’s face.

‘I’m just – I’m really glad you’re alive,’ Jensen said. _Like fuck I feel like I can breathe again – ridiculous I’m too far gone – you don’t even like me – not like that –_

Cougar had to shut the thoughts up somehow so he grabbed Jensen roughly, meaning to pull on jacket but grabbing flesh beneath as well, and Jensen whimpered out an ‘ow’ that Cougar quickly swallowed. The kiss was aggressive, needy. Cougar dropped both hands to Jensen’s waist to hold them tight together. Desperate. He couldn’t let him go. Was afraid to.

‘Shit,’ Jensen said, while Cougar mouthed at his throat, bit into his pulse, dragged his tongue along the line of his neck breathing him in. Even this close and he craved more. ‘Cougar,’ he whined, and Cougar pulled their hips closer together, pushed Jensen against the locker. ‘Cougar,’ he repeated, like a mantra, like a prayer, and Cougar rolled their hips together, tugged his shirt up to find the soft skin of his lower back, sucked at his throat –

‘Cougar,’ Jensen said, pushing him way. _What the fuck why am I – I should have this just once at least before he –_

Cougar let out an unsteady breath. It wouldn’t be just the once for him, but longer it went the worse it would be and he needed to say it now. The truth.

‘I have to tell you something,’ Jensen said.  

‘I know,’ Cougar said. Whatever it was, he knew, because he knew everything. ‘I have to tell you something, too.’

‘You know?’ _How do you know -?_ The panic was so visceral Cougar took a step back.

‘I have never told anybody this.’ He had to force himself to meet Jensen’s eyes for this, so that Jensen would know he was telling the truth. ‘It’s something – since I was a child. I can.’ He had to break eye contact. Jensen’s stare was too much. ‘I can read minds.’

 _What the shit –_ ‘No, you can’t.’

‘Think something.’

_I’m thinking you’re a dumbass liar –_

‘I’m not dumb. Or a liar.’

_If you can then you really know –_

‘Yes,’ Cougar said, because he knew everything.

– _you know I’m a shapeshifter –_

‘What?’ he let out, a gasp, a shock of a noise against the unexpected. ‘You’re a –’

‘I’m a shapeshifter,’ Jensen said, and Cougar had to sit down.

 

‘I didn’t know,’ was the first thing Cougar said when he thought he could trust his voice to say anything at all.

‘You said you can read minds which means you know everything which means you know that I’m a shapeshifter and also that I jerk off to you like all the goddamn time,’ _– oh my god Jensen shut up –_ ‘and you know what I’m going to say before I say it –’ _and you knew I’m a shapeshifter or at least you know now and no one’s ever known before – at least you believe me I guess – I think I believe you it’s not like you’d joke about this –_ ‘How did you not know, if it’s true, you didn’t you know that I can go furry?’

‘You never thought about being a shapeshifter.’

‘Yes I do. It’s like, number one most common thought I have.’

‘What do you shift into?’ Cougar asked, feeling faint.

‘Anything. Cats, mostly. Cheetahs, they’re easy.’ _Saw them at the zoo when I was a kid – this means we can talk without me talking – can you think thoughts back at me?_

‘I cannot project,’ Cougar said.

_Never been able to do birds could maybe do flightless birds but who wants to be an ostrich –_

‘That’s why you’re colour-blind,’ Cougar realised.

‘How do you know that?’ _Obviously you’ve thought about it you dumb shit –_

‘I dream your dreams. Everyone’s dreams.’

‘Shit.’ _Even Roque you poor fucker that’s gotta be fucking miserable –_ ‘Why are you telling me? If you’ve never told anyone – I’ve never told anyone I can shift, why are you telling me?’

‘I like you,’ Cougar said, and then, because he realised that his own fear shouldn’t take precedence over honesty given that he could hear exactly what Jensen was thinking, he corrected himself, ‘I love you.’

Cougar waited for more, but that was it, just that sad, single little thought.

‘I love you, too. Didn’t you know?’

‘Apparently not,’ Cougar said. He had a lot of questions but wasn’t used to asking anything at all. ‘Your sister,’ he began, and drifted off.

‘She’s a shifter, too. Parents, I guess. Dunno, didn’t stay with them long enough to really find out. There’s no full moon, no need. If I don’t ever then I probably don’t have to but I feel better if I have. Can’t do part of my body, can’t do people, can’t do mythological creatures, or anything I haven’t seen in the flesh.’ _Any other questions – mind reading explains so much about you – still kinda horny would like to get back to that if that’s still on the table – I hope it is – oh my god –_ ‘You trust me.’

‘Yes.’

‘Move, I need to sit down,’ Jensen said, and sat down next to him on the narrow bed. Without asking or even thinking about asking he took Cougar’s hand like it was the most natural thing in the world, twined their fingers together and held them tight.

 _Never thought I’d see a day where you trusted me – but you haven’t told anyone this and I haven’t told anyone except for Jess –_ ‘Your family? Do they -?’

‘No,’ said Cougar. ‘Not that I know of,’ he corrected, and wondered what he’d missed. What else he’d missed, what other secrets hiding in people’s brains he’d just never overheard for their not being at the forefront when he was nearby.

_I still want to kiss you – can I –_

Cougar kissed him, the angle awkward, arms caught uncomfortably between them, so he pushed Jensen back onto the mattress and kissed him again.

 _This is – use your words you gotta use your words –_ ‘This isn’t just tonight, right?’ _Please I couldn’t – this is too scary you could hurt me so bad –_

He lay still on the bed beneath Cougar, and Cougar couldn’t cope with that.

‘I won’t tell anyone about you,’ he promised. ‘I love you.’ The second time it had hit the air and it still felt true. ‘This –‘

‘You wanna ask me to go steady with you?’ Jensen teased, but the pounding of his heart and the sudden indecipherable rush of his thoughts belied his nervousness.

‘Yes,’ he said.

 _This is ridiculous – I nearly died today and now you’re looking like you’re gonna fuck me or break apart – I love you I love you – I wanna marry you –_  ‘You heard all that,’ he said in a rush of air against Cougar’s partly-open mouth still warm from Jensen’s lips.

‘I don’t take everything seriously.’

Jensen rose up a little to meet him in an open-mouthed kiss. ‘Good,’ he said. ‘But I do. Love you, I mean.’

‘Good,’ Cougar said, letting himself get pulled down. ‘I’m staying,’ he said, and had never felt as certain about a thing as he did about that. 


End file.
